Postcards from Mars (more like post-it from Mars)
by CopyC
Summary: An attempt to translate a couple of chapters of "Cartoline da Marte", just to see if I'm able to and if it works in a different language. Few different moments after Charley & the mice's return on Mars.
1. six months after (Stoker phone home)

Hey, I'm in vacation and wanted to try translating 2 or 3 chapters in English. This is the first time I try something like this, I hope I did a not too horrible job of translation.  
This one is the sixth chapter of Cartoline da Mars: six months after Charley's arrival on Mars.

* * *

They hadn't heard from Stoker since he pressed the transporter switch and sent the three mice and Charley back on Mars, he choosing to stay back, on Earth, with his daughter.

It wasn't like they were too seriously anxious for him: in the end the old timer has never been, how to put it…the kind of guy inclined to share his projects and plans. He was a lone wolf kind of mouse. But not even receive, in all that time, a postcard with the proverbial "All ok, we're having fun!"? That wasn't nice bro.  
Moreover Charlene left him with the keys to her garage and in that building there was everything you needed to contact Mars: you just had to sit at the console, in the truck their terrestrial friend, and type the accessing code the mice used to communicate with Carbine during their second stay on Earth.  
But there had not been all that machinery already ready for use, Stoker amply demonstrated (with their great surprise) to possess quite the scientific genius: for how they saw it, he could easily build an interplanetary radio, or a robotic space-homing pigeon, or a message in a jet-propulsion glass bottle, right?  
He did see E.T. on cable, didn't he?! If that sort of naked, deformed cat did it, then Stoker could do it too. So, hell, why didn't he call them yet?!  
Among them all, perhaps it was Carbine the least worried about her ex-general: it wasn't the first time he disappeared and certainly it wouldn't have been the last. On top of that, he already did well on the alien planet, in other occasions, under well less favorable conditions and on his own; now what was the greater risk that Stoker was running? Indigestion of burgers while watching a football game? Please.

"You chased him for a year, you know the guy: he'll show up when he'll feel like it... " she exclaimed when Vinnie, for the umpteenth time, in his own way expressed a bit of concern for his old mentor.

"And he is with his daughter" Throttle added "He would never dive head first in dangerous situations with her with him".  
But underneath, Throttle himself wasn't really, completely convinced of his own statement: he had to deal with Stoker for way too long to seriously believe that, with age, he had become less reckless. But Spitfire seemed a levelheaded girl to him, maybe she was having a good influence on her father. Maybe she would have kept her father out of trouble ...

"But you met her, right?" Charlene asked him in mild disbelief and amusement "Spitfire is a spitting image of Stoker. And I'm not speaking just of her looks"

It took another four months for them to have any news from father and daughter, but when he decided to reconnect with his freedom fighters, the ex-general did it with style: he obviously enjoyed special effects and to enter the scene in the most spectacular way, at least that last one was made very clear.

It was in the dead of the night when suddenly someone started knocking frantically at the door of Carbine's house. Throttle was the one that went to open.  
The person on the other side of the door, which was still storming of shots to draw the house owners' attention, stopped with his fist in the midair when the door was opened, revealing the figure of Throttle: the glasses were a little crooked and low on the honey colored furred mouse's muzzle, he had mattress-matted hair, wore an old XL shirt with the writing "I'm not a ninja turtle" and a pair of chenille pants, of a bright, electric blue, rather worn and loose. He had been clearly just woken up.  
The other stood there for a moment, just watching him silently, from head to foot, with a vaguely disgusted look. Then he spoke:  
"Do you really wear this stuff to sleep?" he asked to Throttle first.

"Vinnie, do you have some other smart comment for me before I punch you for throwing me out of my bed at this time of the night?"

"No, seriously: I'm kinda ashamed for you right now... " his friend replied. Then the white mouse's gaze slipped from him to Carbine, who had reached her mate in the hallway and was now standing behind him " ... and you share your bed with Santa?!" Vinnie added greatly amused.

The general, still a bit dazed, was clutching at the red dressing gown she was tightly wrapped in and from under which only her bare feet could be seen. She was watching the white mouse as if trying to remember who exactly he was and then, in a voice thick with sleep, she turned to Throttle:  
"I've just decided that from tonight on, idiocy is punishable by court-martial and I authorize you to kill him" Carbine didn't look particularly happy at the idea of being woken up just to receive insults on her nightwear. And from Vinnie, moreover.

Throttle grumbled her a "I wish it was that easy..." and then, after a huge yawn, he asked again to his friend what the hell he wanted from them.  
Vinnie didn't answer directly, nor he expected to be formally invited to come in, but he quickly slipped through the door and Throttle and entered the house.

"This is something you have to see!" he exclaimed, going further inside without too many pleasantries, heading toward the hall where the couple kept their video-computer and, dragging a chair from the hallway, he sat in front of it.

"No, please, make yourself comfortable. Do as if you were in your own house ... " Carbine commented in a caustic tone of voice.

"Thanks Carb! Would you be a doll and give me something to drink? I've run here and now I'm so very thirsty!" Vinnie replied cheerfully, lighting up their computer screen in the meantime.

At that point Throttle quickly rested a hand on his mate's shoulder (to stop her before she pounced his friend) and gave her a look that, translated into words, would have probably sounded like something along the line of: please, don't…try to be patient, if I didn't bump him off myself in almost twenty years of friendship, there is a reason. Now I don't remember it, but it must be very good!  
At that Carbine dropped her arms to her sides and snorted loudly rolling her eyes.

Vinnie didn't notice the couple's nonverbal exchange and, highly excited, was still messing with the satellite controls, searching for some particular frequency.

"Tonight I wasn't sleepy so I turned the TV on to see if there was something interesting and ..."

"Vin, if it's AGAIN some stupid replica of some stupid bike race you won, I swear to the Gods of Mars that I'll kick you out and to you house!"

"It's not! Look!" the mouse exclaimed, pointing to the video: it was tuned in to an advertising channel, that kind of channels touting the same blenders and shaping underwear for 20 hours straight. At the moment, the transmissions were interrupted (even in the United States it was to be the middle of the night): you couldn't see anything, except for a black screen accompanied by a monotonous background buzz.

"Fascinating ..." was Carbine's dry comment.

"Wait just a minute," Vinnie blurted impatiently.

"I'm sleepy and tired. This thing you want to show us, can't it wait until tomorrow? "

"One minute, I said!"

They stayed in contemplative silence for more than a minute, staring at a blank screen and, in Carbine's case, getting progressively irritated at each more second lost. Throttle had instead slumped on the armchair of the sofa and seemed perfectly ready to fall asleep again exactly where he was.  
Vinnie was impassible, but suddenly the sound of an intense electrostatic discharge crept in the air and his ears instinctively oriented towards the loudspeakers.  
"Here we are!" the white mouse exclaimed excitedly.

_*_Shhhhhhhhhhh_ …uys? Can you he… *_Shhhh_*…me? *_Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh_* …itfire, the right knob, the calibrat… *_Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh_* ...ould pick up the sign … *_Shhhhhhhhh_* …oker to Mars. Stoker to Mars. Can you…*_Shhhssssssssshhhhhhh_* … 14.00 EDT. Repeat, I … *_Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh_* …at 41°55'5…*_Shhhhhhhh_* …5'55.1"N and 87°42'44… *_Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh_* …ell to Charl…*S_hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh_*_

"Stoker ?!" Throttle and Carbine shouted in unison, leaning forward and pushing Vinnie aside to get closer to the screen.

"This message has been sent in loop for at least an hour now, on every terrestrial wavelength " Vinnie explained "the old man must have cracked the signals from the Earth"

The motorcyclist then pressed another button, tuning to a different frequency, a channel of old black and white classics. Instead of music, as a soundtrack to an elegant couple dancing a lively foxtrot, there was Stoker's voice.

"It's everywhere!"

"Huh?"

"It's in every single Earth channel!" Vinnie grinned, looking upward and spreading his arms as if indicating everything around him "And the whole Mars is listening! Damn, probably the whole solar system is listening to Stoker, right now! "

Few minutes later Carbine was contacted from the martial headquarters. They waited before calling her, to be sure, but now they were all quite alarmed there. There was a problem, something big: someone was trying to infiltrate the communication frequencies of Mars from outside the planet!  
They had, yes, tried to square the signal source, but other than identify the Earth as the origin point of the signal, it was impossible to define the exact spot from which it was forwarded: one moment it was a large city in Eastern Europe, a second later a small town South Africa, shortly after was a ship in the exact middle of the Indian Ocean.  
"Yes, I am informed" was Carabine's dry answer. With the communicator in her hand, she moved into the bedroom to get quickly dressed as she continued talking to her direct subordinate.  
"Do not give any alarm for the moment. I don't think there is any imminent danger, but I'm on my way. I'll see you in my office in forty minutes"  
After closing the connection, Carbine moaned tiredly "How is it possible for that mouse to be able to stir apocalyptic chaos even when he is on a different planet?" she asked to nobody in particular.

The short message was transmitted for a total of 2 hours, looped, with 5-minute intervals, but then, suddenly, the signal was simply stopped at the source .

The old general's message was cause of a great deal of agitation among Martian 'powers that be' and upper echelons. What the provisional government initially feared the most was that Stoker could have led Earth to discover Mars' little secret; having your favorite movie interrupted by a voiceover made crackled due to a badly set microphone can ruin your evening , but having your favorite movie interrupted by a voiceover made crackled due to a badly set microphone AND discover that the above-mentioned voice belongs to a compatriot of yours that endangers the whole "let Earth continuing to believe that Mars is an inhabited planet" thing… well, that can seriously piss you off . Especially if you're in the security council.

To strike a blow for him, we have to say Stoker hadn't been so stupid to actually put the secrecy of his people existence in danger: his signal was relayed so many times and by so many repeaters , bouncing from one continent to another , that no one on Earth ever managed to figure out who really was behind it and to who, exactly, it was actually destined .

Then, the fact that the language used in it wasn't exactly known , helped things .

All the Strategic and Security Intelligence of Europe, Asia, Africa and America thought of encrypted codes and searched in their blacklists, looking for a possible enemy culprit or suspect, but no one in their right mind would have ever thought of it as a voice message addressed to another planet! Later , a couple of UFO-conspiracy believers timidly proposed that hypothesis, in a new-age blog, but it was obviously let to die with a general laughter by the internet community. If they only knew...

However, in the meanwhile, even on his own home planet, to figure out what exactly Stocker was trying to say in that damn message, wasn't exactly an easy task: clearly he had transmitted indications of a time and partial coordinates, but other than that, nada: the rest of the sound was too much distorted for them to be able to recover something more. In the immediate aftermath an emergency task force was quickly organized, which had seen involved, despite herself, even the most recent human guest of Mars: Charlene had been very puzzled by the summoning and, even more, by the questions she got asked:  
\- Of course, she knew Stoker very well.  
\- Hey, no! Not so well. What were they trying to insinuate? He was almost twice her age!  
\- Sure, they were friend.  
\- Yes, they collaborated in the past.  
\- No, she didn't know exactly what he was doing on Earth, but accordingly to what he said, before they left, he wanted to clean up the mess made by the regenerator. And, she supposed, he was going to have fun, while he was at it.  
\- No, she didn't know either what the meaning was behind Stok's strange message (in fact she didn't even hear it!). Mainly because she – as she kept repeating countless time - had not yet learned the language used by Stocker. He ... Martian. She… Earthling ... did they get this? Different planets? Different languages? The night before Stoker could as well have declaimed a Shakespearean sonnet and to her it would have been pretty much the same.  
\- For Real? No, she didn't know. But were they really sure he said her name?  
\- Coordinates to what? Northeast, American Continent?  
\- Could they show it to her, on a map?

... "Hey, but that's my house!"

If the question "where" found an answer (even if it raised few other questions for them to mull over, such as what Stoker was doing in the old and now abandoned garage the Last Stand), for the "when" the situation was just a tiny bit more complicated: 14:00 terrestrial time, he said, ok, but of what day exactly? That part of the communication was lost in the cosmic interferences.  
Eventually they discovered that 14.00 belonged to a Thursday of August (August 21th for Earth. The middle of dust storms season for Mars) and it corresponded to the moment in which the two planets were closer in their circle around the sun, with the North America well oriented toward the red planet.

It is not like in the meantime there was been another clarifier message, nor they understood it by themselves, but at some point of August 21th the Martians guessed that maybe, just maybe, that one was the day chosen by Stoker when, in the exact center of the military base where Carbine and the boys were allocated, there was a violent fluorescent flash that momentarily blinded everyone and suddenly a huge wooden and metal crate, completely sealed, appeared from nowhere. Pinned on it there was a little note: "with love, Stoker!".

The box contained a number of a machinery parts and precise directions to how to assemble what appeared to be the largest translator ever conceived. And of course there were also two cases of beer, with the compliments of the house.  
Carbine immediately confiscated the beers and gave order to use an old, disused hangar to work on the machine and, in the meantime, to also try figuring out what Stoker wanted to make of it.

The machine soon proved to be exactly what they imagined, aka a translator able of handling unusually high volumes of information.

They built it faithfully to the enclosed IKEA-style handbook sent by Stoker, who, incidentally, had a horrendous calligraphy that made the task quite a feat for the base engineers, including Charlene.

At its completion, civilians were temporarily evacuated, army bigwigs were summoned, half a dozen of well armed soldiers were deployed along the perimeter with guns diligently aimed at the machine and a scientist, with the expression of who was expecting that it will explode in his face, turned on Stoker's transportator.

It did not explode.

It made a nice "beep" and a recorded voice (the same voice that had been heard two months before, for just about two hours, on all of the Earth channels) cheerfully announced:

"Hello rookies and thank you for choosing Stok Transports Enterprise, your call has been forwarded! Hi rookies and thank you for choosing Stok Transports Enterprise, your call has been forwarded! Hello rookies and thanks for ... " Elevator music played softly in the background.

Now they were all quite confused. Lot. And also vaguely offended by that "rookies".

Suddenly, however, as it begun, even the new recording was interrupted, but this time it was replaced by a female voice, in live:

"_Wait ... How do I answer? Do I have to press it before speaking_?" It was a girl. Charlene recognized her immediately: their speaker was Spitfire.

"_No, you are already on line_" someone else commented in response, in the background, this time a male. Stoker.

"_Ah, ok ... Hoi, do you hear me? Mars, here Chicago, do you copy_? "

The scientist came forward "Here Mars. We receive you loud and clear "

Spitfire seemed impressed "_Really? Hey, this thing is really working! Dad, come here, we have them!_ "

"_Did you doubted your old man's abilities? Stand aside pumpkin, please, let me sit down. Ah, and do me a little favor too: call the guy and put him in connection with us_ "

There was a little buzz while the two of them were obviously exchanging seat and microphone.

"_And here I am! Wow guys, surely you there took your sweet time to rebuild my ... Hey, by the way, who am I speaking with?_ "

The scientist had just taken a breath to answer him when Carbine grabbed him by the collar of his lab coat and unceremoniously snatched the microphone away:

"Stoker, what the hell are you doing ?!" she roared into it.

"_Are_ _my little ears wrong or this is the sweet, sweet voice of my favorite general?_" the mature soldier mocked her.

There was an amused murmur among the soldiers: very few could afford such a casual tone with their leader and it was always a sight to assist to how aggressively she normally reacted. Unfortunately for them, this time Carbine chose to ignore it.

"Stoker, right now we are in conference with the high colonels of the Martian infantry, air force and army. Do you understand? There are all of them! And they are very curious to know what you're doing" This was one of those cases in which the word euphemism was no longer sufficient to describe a statement. There was also a pretty clear subtext: "Don't say something stupid, something we all repent. Me in particular. "

"_Woa, the big guns moved for me? I am so honored_ "

"Stoker!"

"_Ok, ok rookie, don't heat up!" he laughed, "Is Charley there with you_?"

"And what about her now?"

"_Everything. So, is she there?_"

"One moment, she is coming. In the meantime, while we are waiting for her, would you be so kind to expand the concept? " Carbine asked, while turning and beckoning to Charlene to come closer.

"_Actually she is the one I wanted to speak with from the beginning. But you're such a nice bonus, I am always happy to have these little chats with you. All right there at home? Throttle?_ "

"Ehhm ... Stoker this isn't the right moment to go personal" Carbine replied mechanically. The last thing she wanted was to discuss her private business with her bosses and her subordinates in attentive listening.

In the meantime the human girl quickly reached Carbine, with a curious expression on her face: without the psychic link the mice unconsciously used to connect to each other and to any other sentient being in the proximity of their antennae, she could understand only Carbine's part of the dialog, the rest was out of her linguistics skills. She really had to start studying the native language of her three beloved rodents, she reasoned: half of the fun was lost when they decided to use Martian and communicated by radio.

"Hello Stoker" exclaimed when she reached the console, next to Carbine.

"_Hey, beautiful!"_ He replied cheerfully, in English "_How are you? Do you like Mars?_ "

"Yeah, not bad. But it is the company that matters anyway, not the place "

"_True, true ..._"

"So, you know that I am always happy to talk to you, but could you tell me why you need me?" She asked the man.

"_Can't a mouse chat with a pretty girl without having ulterior motives in mind?" But then he paused "Or rather, perhaps it would be more correct to say: can't a mouse chat with a pretty girl exactly because he really has ulterior motives ... you know, the kind of motivations inappropriate for children?_" the former general was in full playful courtship mode, rich of not too concealed allusions. Charlene grinned, waiting the inevitable continuation. She didn't have to wait:

"_And tell Vincent that ..._"

"Look, you can spare us this little show of yours, Vinnie is not even here right now!" She stopped him, giggling.

"_Ah! Too bad..." he said, sounding a bit disappointed and immediately returning to his usual tone of voice "His reactions are always so funny when it comes to someone flirting with you that ..._ "

"Stoker, do you think you'll manage to say what we want to know before sunset?" Carbine intervened "You know, we all have better things to do!"

"_Yes, yes. Ok ... a mouse doesn't report for seven months and this is the welcome back?_" he grumbled back.  
"_So, back to business. First of all: do you like the gift I sent you?_ "

"Nice, but Christmas is still far away, you know" the general replied.

"_Witty. What you have before your eyes is, I guess you have understood, a transporter_ "

"Yes, dumb as we are, we got that" Carbine said ironically.

"_Good boys. It's a ... No, actually it is "the" transporter. The first Martian, operating and not hackable. A gem, let me tell you: our old enemies' ones in comparison were vintage stuff. But what probably you still don't know is that in fact it is also a bridge, it not only works by input of signal, such as the Plutarchian transporter, but by a continuous transmission, bidirectional and with unlimited mass range" _his voice leaked a whisper of pride.

"Oh!" Charlene let slip from his lips a sound of surprise, amazed and admired, as she was now watching the machine once more time: maybe the others had not yet grasped what Stoker just said implied, but she did.

"_Exactly Charley. It's a bridge. Earth and Mars are officially connected without alignment barrier. Oh, by the way, the other half of it is here, in your basement!_ "

"Stoker, I'm happy, but ... you can't do it, you have to find another place. Sooner or later the authorities will come to check for me. With me here on Mars my garage will be auctioned by the bank. Do not ... "

"_And here, Charley, you are wrong_" another voiceover intervened. A third person was added to the conversation, along with Stoker and Spitfire "_Is always good to hear your voice. I'm glad to know you're okay_"

"... Jack ?!" she breathlessly exclaimed, when she recognized him "Jack, is it you?"

"_Yes, in the flesh. Hello Charley!_ "

"Jack! Oh my God, what are you doing there?"

"_Well, "there" just metaphorically speaking, of course. In fact I'm in my office in San Francisco_ "

"_We are in audio conference. Very professional, isn't it?_ " laughed Spitfire.

"_Hey, my friend, you disappear without notice and you think no one notices? You know, you've left a lot of people worried for you down here!_" Jack affectionately scolded Charlene.

The woman blushed violently at the sudden burst of guilt: obviously she thought about it, but when she realized it was too late: by then she was on Mars and there was no way to contact anyone or reassure old friends. How could she?  
"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry" Charley tried to justify, apologizing "Really, it was a decision made on the fly, I do not ..."

"_Don't worry Charley, your friend Stoker already explained everything_"

"But how? ..."

"_Five months ago I was in Chicago for a conference and I went to see you. Imagine my surprise when I find your garage closed and -again- an enormous mouse pointing a gun to my head as I try to enter, using the spare key, you know, the one hidden in the frame of the window on the back!_"

"_In my defense, the kid here could have very well been a thief!_" Stoker said.

"_Thieves don't politely knock at the door. Anyway, long story short, he told me what was going on and ..._ "

"_And now you're in society with Jack!_" Spitfire exclaimed in the background, beating the human in an explanatory rush.

"Eh?!" Charlene asked automatically, taken quite by surprise and just as much confused by the adolescent Martian's statement.

"_Let me explain_" Stoker intervened "_You already received two notifications for unpaid taxes and the mortgage on your property. We had to intervene, or you would have been expropriated of the garage. But with you unreachable and me ... well I that don't exactly have the look of your average human being who can safely go in a bank, we had to be imaginative: you're a junior associate of a new McCyber's startup in Chicago and, as of your partner, he was able to arrange the payment while you're ... uh ... in a business trip abroad. You are officially stationed in Europe now, just for future references. Then, tell us about Paris: are you enjoying the Eternal City?_ "

By the time Stoker ended his explanatory monologue, Charlene was speechless with a dazed expression on her face. she didn't know what to say. In fact, she didn't even know what to think!

"You get confuse with Rome ..." she tried to joke, but her brain was too busy processing all of what Stoker said.

"_Since we were at it, we also thought to buy the properties next to your garage: you are currently in negotiations for purchasing half of the block, here in Chicago_" added Jack "_You know, for our society_"

"_This should ensure a minimum of tranquility in the years ahead. None will appear to pry into your stuff_ "

"But how ... what ..." she tried to say. Too much information here: she doesn't understand anything! What the hell were those three doing? "Guys, I can't afford it, you know that in my account there is barely of what to pay the heating! The only thing I possess on earth, apart from the garage, is my truck and it's not like it has a great value!"

"_Ah, yeah, for that ..._" Stoker answered, his voice suddenly nervous. Charley immediately pricked her antennae (so to say): the giant rodent's embarrassed tone did not promise anything good.

"_You know, there was a small problem and ... well ... your truck had a little mishap ..._"

"A ... mishap? And my truck had this mishap all by itself ?!" Charlene's tone of voice by then had inadvertently changed, revealing a hint of involuntary aggressiveness and sarcasm. Stoker could not see her, but he could very well imagine the woman's eyebrows begin to rise above two quite miffed green eyes.

"_It didn't. It was helped_" Spitfire retorted before her father could find some excuse "_And to define a truck that goes into spontaneous combustion a small problem, to me it seems like minimizing the issue, dad_"

"_But on whose side are you? Don't add fuel to the fire!_ "

"_This is what I told you, just after that we ended up in the ditch, when there was that strange short circuit in the truck!_"

"Anyway" Jack said hoping to stop the silly bickering between father and daughter "for the money, you don't have to worry. Obviously we are taking care of it "

Charlene needed a few seconds to record the last statement of her friend. It was justifiable, her mind was a bit occupied in mourning for his poor - and practically new - truck, innocent victim of Martians without a license and without scruples..."What? No! Jack, I can't let you spend that kind money to ..."

"_Look, I haven't paid a penny" Jack replied laughing "In fact, to be perfectly honest, I actually had a little profit_"

"Uh?"

"_The idea was mine_" the one speaking was now Spitfire again "_We were watching a movie. Something about a flying alien with a human look -what scarce fantasy- in blue spandex and red pants -but who is so dumb to wear pants above stocking, I guess- that, at one point, turned coal into a diamond. And I thought, why don't we do the same? You know, with the regenerator and everything ..._ "

"_We paid off your mortgage. Your garage will be yours forever: in the future it will be your lawyer to handle the relations with banks and the taxes payment_" Jack said at that point.

"Why? Do I also have a lawyer now?"

"_Didn't we tell you? The owner of the land on which the first Martian outpost and secret embassy of Mars on Earth will be built, must have a lawyer_ " Stoker happily concluded, as matter of fact.

"Ah, right ..." Charlene at that point had to sit down.

Later, only a few hours later, Charlene found herself sitting again, this time around a table, with Carbine at her side, Throttle reassuringly standing behind her and an indefinite number of Martian authorities, military and non, sitting in front of her, to discuss her positions regarding the "bomb" dropped by Stoker that afternoon.  
They seemed very intrigued by all the opportunities and countless possibilities that this project opened for the planet. Charlene would have never wished something horrible to someone before, but in that moment, if she were to find Stoker anytime soon, she would probably have strangled him with bare hands for the troubles he was putting her through!

Secret outpost? Yeah, right! Martian mice were so famous for their secrecy, discretion and moderation ... how much long would it have remained secret? 20 minutes ?! No. Probably 10 seconds would have already been a success ...  
Back in 1996 there were already rumors about three very strange motorcyclists, vigilantes that rode in its street, moving with the grace of an armored panzer. And now the Martians were expecting to be able to make a whole section of mice like Vinnie, Throttle or Modo pass unnoticed? Ha, ha, ha! That was hilarious!  
Earth was about to be invaded by a mass of showy furry aliens, benevolent and full of good intentions, of course, but also highly destructive, noisy and excitable. And all that would have started from her poor, poor, poor little garage ... Charlene shook her head, not sure she really wanted to have something to do with it and, really, now she was even so much happier than before at the idea of being on Mars, well away from Chicago!


	2. One year later (first part)

I was a VxC shipper so I hope you will forgive me if I indulge in the 2 chapters of "Postcards from Mars" that in 2007 I wrote specifically about them. I swear I don't have any more of these in English, so don't worry. The awfull translation is ended.

* * *

**One year later (first part)**

Then, few months after the first anniversary of her arrival on Mars , it just happened. Between her and Vinnie. It happened.

One evening they all gathered at her house, in the garden, for a dinner with old and new friends like they already did so many other times before, organized at the last moment, when everyone brings something to eat and the guys are likely to fuss around to the grid , each of them having his say on everything, from the charcoal, to the cooking time, to the condiments to use, up to the height of the flame, that no, if you want to do a barbecue, there shouldn't be any. Yes instead! No, damn! Hey, careful there, the wind is changing: you are smoking us! Who taught you to cook? The embers! Don't let the embers unattended!  
The kind of dinner where, in the background, the DVD player plays a movie that no one follows and you end up eating too much or drinking way too much and you relax like never before, you never look at your watch and laugh to tears, laugh your head off for everything, even the most stupid jokes, surrounded by loved ones, who are laughing with you.

At some point, however, Charlene was back in the house, having threw herself on the sofa: she pulled her feet on, tilted her head back and closed her eyes. "Just a minute to catch my breath" she thought "Maybe two... or three".  
She was enjoying the evening, she really was, but she hadn't stopped one minute since dawn (the rumor had spread that the talent with the engines of the young Earthling was remarkable and work was increasing day by day) and honestly, she was beginning to feel the weariness of a very long day. She was also quite convinced that she would never be able to take off her boots from her now aching feet, but that was something she would have worried about at bed time.  
For now she was content to relax just for a moment in the silence of that little room, while outside her friends were still knuckling down to the beers and desserts.  
"I love this couch" She thought, just instants before napping away.

To wake her, not long after she had fallen asleep, had been the feeling of something incredibly cold leaning suddenly and decisively against her cheek. Something that was horribly wet and was dripping very cold condensation on her skin.

Charlene inhaled sharply and her eyes widened in astonishment and for the not exactly pleasant feeling, but if she had not clearly heard Vinnie's subdued giggle a fraction of a second before feeling the frosted glass on her skin, she would have been probably scared a lot more.  
Fortunately for her, however, the boy had never been known for his sneakiness (his more refined idea of a surprise prank since she knew him comprehended explosives, a megaphone, the Ride of the Valkyries mp3, two kilos of garlic and Throttle's underwear): with that giggle escaped from his lips, his friend lost part of the surprise effect.  
Charlene opened her eyes to find Vinnie looking down at her, clearly amused and very pleased with himself for his joke. He was leaning on the backrest of the couch, behind her, hands propped on each side of the woman's head and, in one, the bottle of cold beer he pressed against her cheek.  
On the face one his crooked smile, a smile that was at the same time childish and braggart, the smile that was always ready to show itself at the oddest times and seemed to be the signature of his face.

"Funny Vinnie. Reeeeeeally funny" she dryly said, while a cold shiver ran down the spine. She glowered, or at least she tried, pretending to be annoyed, as she instinctively brought the back of her hand to the neck, blocking the race of a drop of water that, implacable, was running towards the neckline of her t-shirt.

"Hey honey, you looked flushed! " He sneered, drinking a sip of beer from the bottle. Then he sighed dramatically, adding "The story of my life, my kindness is never appreciated". In the meanwhile, on his face, that lopsided smile was widening progressively "I'm so misunderstood"

"Yeah , right ... " she commented sarcastically.  
But the girl's ironic smile slowly turned into a genuine one. It was impossible to resist: you could pretend that Vinnie irked your nerves, that you couldn't stand him anymore, but the truth was that there were times in which you just wanted join his carefreeness, throw your arm around his shoulders and, laughing, head with him wherever -more or less- he wanted to go.

Vinnie wasn't a kid and, even if he constantly played the idiot, surely he wasn't a fool: while constantly joking about his vanity or ego, Charlene never forgot that underneath all that false insensitivity and bravado lurked someone deeper, multifaceted and complex . And yet ... and yet there was something irresistibly fresh in him, a kind of light that shone even in the darkest moments and that probably never changed since he was a child. It was this aspect of him that she always found intriguing in Vinnie. Charlene never confessed anything of this to his friend, but she suspected he already knew.

"Nice evening" Vinnie commented absently, shortly after, looking out the window, at the garden, where the others continued to celebrate the night and seemed to have no intention to conclude so soon that impromptu gathering under the stars of the Martian sky.

" Yeah" Charlene followed his gaze and she was now watching the movements outside of her house.  
For a while they simply stayed that way, in peaceful silence, watching Throttle and Carbine dance slowly in the dim light of the lanterns, Modo quietly chatting with a group of old friends from the times of the Plutarkian wars and new colleagues. Probably somewhere Spitfire was still tentatively flirting with him and Rimfire, Charlene could almost see him, sat rigid, extremely confused and embarrassed by such unexpected attention from a girl so young.  
Meanwhile someone started singing a song in the ancient Martian language: a man's voice, deep and warm, intoned words that she couldn't yet understand, but it was a beautiful melody and she found herself thinking that this music seemed to caress her and reassure her. She felt at peace and relaxed.

"You were great" Vinnie, still staring toward the garden, spoke so softly, almost whispering to himself, that she barely heard him.  
The girl looked up at him again, intrigued by the phrase, but from that spot, if in turn he didn't bend his head toward her, she could only see his chest and chin and, as much as Vinnie had a nice Adam's apple, it wasn't particularly expressive. She did great, in what? In organizing the dinner? It seemed strange. But what did he mean? Was he teasing her perhaps?  
In doubt, she mumbled a " Uhhh, thanks ... I think".

Here , it was just after that brief exchange of words, shortly after that moment. As if it was a gesture they often did: he turned to her and suddenly his eyes were a little different, it was like... Charlene would have never known how to describe it , but it was as if in that moment she had seen in him a different person and, at the same time , paradoxically, someone closer to the real Vinnie .

There had been another smile. Quiet, confident and sweet, a smile she knew she was returning, identical . The boy leaned slowly toward her while she, at the same time, was sitting slightly more upright on the couch, just stretching the neck with equal serene fluency so that their mouths met halfway. The kiss was gentle and relaxed, lips just pressed together for a few instants, gently and doubtlessly. It was a kiss not different from many others exchanged over the years, chaste gestures of friendship, greeting or playful teasing under the mistletoe. But this time there was a new meaning that in that moment they both accepted as if it was the most obvious, natural thing in the world and when the kiss ended, a few moments later, neither of them was embarrassed or felt uncomfortable. "How many Rakaji's spicy wings did you eat?" Charlene asked him. The boy's breath betrayed his gluttony and she could smell the aroma and flavor of that exotic dish on his skin. "A few" he replied laconic, without giving any further explanations if by that "a few" he meant a couple or two dozens. Charlene suspected two dozens. " What do you think, shall we go back to the garden?" .

Without drama and without fireworks, the first kiss between the human and the Martian took place in the privacy of her home, in the most simple and serene of the possible ways; together they reached the others outside, without feeling the need to talk about what just happened. After all, what was there to say that they haven't already known for ages?  
One moment they were friends, best friends , and the moment later... they still were.

Simply they were also something else.


	3. One year later (few days later)

**First year (a few days later)**

For the second kiss ... no, that one...that one was an experience rather far more sensational than the first one and , in a way, even more memorable. And the sense was not the positive one.

The two would remembered it in the years to come with a mixture of embarrassment, amusement and something like nostalgia... ok, this was a lie. But who did they want to fool? That particular memory brought them exclusively great embarrassment!

In the days after the dinner they stuck together a little more than usual. Not that the dynamics between the two of them changed radically, they kept bickering, teasing and jokingly annoying each other, as usual, but now they also seemed to search for the other's company more often, innocently touching each other with more frequency: a tail that lightly brushed against ankle, a hand that rested on a biceps for a fraction of a second longer than necessary, an arm around a shoulder for a quick, affectionate squeeze. But nothing more .

In the afternoon of three days later, however, things became more interesting and it also became clear to the two of them that they both were more than willing to explore the possibilities of this new aspect of their relationship: it was evident that Charlene and Vinnie were very, very motivated about it in that moment.

A caress became a brief hug and it soon became something of more vivaciously "serious" when the two strongly clutched to the other. At that point, the only thought in their heads was the idea of kissing again adding the accumulated desire: mouths searched each other, but when they tried to, so to speak, "go deeper on the subject", things went horribly wrong.

Both of them were thrown in the momentum of the act in reliance on their instincts and on their previous experiences. Unfortunately, none of these experiences concerned to kiss an alien being and suddenly the two found themselves lost in practical difficulties of two faces surely not structured to interact so intimately .

His mouth, that spread from one side to the other of his long muzzle, was remarkably larger than Charlene never really realized before and when they first slightly and then fully opened their lips to explore each other, for an irrational fraction of second, she had the horrible feeling that he was going to literally eat her face ... there had been a bit of confusion on the distances.

In turn, Vinnie didn't know how to handle her soft human lips that, yes, were very nice and inviting, but they seemed to have a life of their own, as if they were an independent part of the small mouth of his partner! And then he was also having an incredible difficulty in respiring, his nose practically pressed into her hair, completely disoriented and out of sync with her breathing.

When finally the boy's sharp incisors pressed with involuntary vehemence against Charlene's skin, the two separated from each other with a jolt, as if they had been hit by an electric discharge. All of this lasted no more than five seconds, but it was more than enough.

Followed few moments of panic in which none of them moved a muscle, a mutual grasp on each other's arms, keeping a distance but, at the same time, without letting go, as seeking a balance in the other.  
Their lips tight as if they had just bitten into a lemon and eyes wide and staring, a look of uncertainty mixed with clumsiness. They were too "confused" to even try having other feelings.

Eventually , when their brain finally reconnected, they did the only thing possible: they saw in the other their own expression and then laughed hard. The two didn't stop for many, many minutes and didn't end curled on the floor for the sole reason that they were still tied in that strange embrace and were practically supporting each other, but the mouse had tears in his eyes, while the girl's ears reached a vibrant shade of red and had stated to funnily hiccup.

" It was ... " *hic* " It was ... "

"Awful! " Vinnie completed for her, between laughs.

" It was, wasn't it?! " Charlene exclaimed "the most pathetic kiss *hic* of my life! "

" Gee, I feel like a teenager again" he snorted, a little amused and a little embarrassed. In a corner of his brain, Vinnie was thanking various Martian deities that miraculously no one witnessed the disaster. His reputation ( ? ) would had come out destroyed.

" No, please, not *hic* those years! It was not bad enough to pass *hic* through them once?! "  
Then, after thinking about it for a second, Charlene added, " Oh , God, I *hic* just realized that we just lacked the braches *hic* and it would have been exactly like my first kiss *hic*, on the back of the school, during break, with David Crawlford. *hip* But , that time honestly it went way better! "

" Hey! " He blurted out, sounding mockingly offended " It can't be worse than the one with that ... how the hell did you say his name was? Crew .. Crawv ... that junior high school boy! "

She laughed louder "Hell yes! "

At that point she felt his hands suddenly leave her forearms and then the warm touch of his palms on the face: the was pressing her cheeks so that her lips were comically protruded outward, as if she was a goldfish .

"Sweetheart, it's not me having a face as flat as a surfboard with two lips planted in the middle of it! Of course it couldn't work, but you have to know that until now no one ever complained of my performances as kisser! "

" ewwwidenshhhes!" she grunted.

" What? " Vinnie asked, slightly releasing his grip on the girl's face of so that she could speak more clearly .

" Evidences *hic* I want evidences! I will not believe you until I see written statements *hic* signed by your exes! "

The young woman then exploited that split second in which he recorded her phrase and began to form a offended expression, to in turn raise her own hands to his face and return the grip. Only she stuck her thumbs in the corners of the boy's mouth, while the other fingers grasped below his ears: gently , but with decision, she then forced his mouth to its full extension and Vinnie seemed now a Martian version of the Batman's Joker.

"And then at least I *hic* I do have lips. What do YOU have apart from a huge mouth that only is needed to..." she would never ended that particular sentence: Vinnie's hand quickly slipped from her cheek to the above mentioned lips, effectively and successfully silencing her.

Looking at her and raising a wry eyebrow, he tried to make fun of the unexpected vulgar turn, but he too was in communicative difficulties due to two thumbs badly hooked behind his molars.

He had to surrender shortly after " Owey!" He mumbled " Owey, you whinn . I'llh let you gohh ifsh you releashh your grishpp! "

Charlene , from behind Vinnie's hand, immediately nodded her approval to the plan : she could feel a slimy warm trickle of saliva flowing from his mouth and along her right wrist and, really , it wasn't the pleasantest feeling ever ... she wanted to stop it before it got to the elbow.

But, while releasing his grip on her face, the martian's other hand quickly slipped on his partner's nape and, when she released him, with very little effort Vinnie dragged her back to him. Then, just lowering his head to cancel the little difference in height, he kissed her again. But this time it was an exact replica of the first kiss they exchanged and, even if it wasn't anything terribly passionate, when it ended they both felt their heads lighter and that their hearts had accelerated its beat just a bit. And the human's hiccups attack had fortunately ended ...

"Charley-girl, we are doomed to a life of old aunt-like kisses" Vinnie gravely sighed, a bit serious and a bit playful, continuing to hold her tightly to him.

Charlene laughed again "Ok, stop there! First of all I hope you don't have an aunt who kisses you like this, or we'll have ask for the social services intervention. Second, accordingly to what people says... " while speaking the back of her hand was stroking the companion's profile while her gaze absently followed the movements of the tufts of fur to that gentle pressure; Vinnie 's eyes became a bit brighter to that touch "... you know, practice leads to perfection ... " .

And so they did . Engage in the practice , I mean.

Needless to say that the differences between the two were much deeper than it appeared at first. The kiss was just the tip of the iceberg : they did have a general idea of what they were going to face, but in the time they were amazed to discover that in fact there were so many more aspects and difficulties they hadn't taken into account.  
But them both were equipped with perseverance and, above all, good fantasy and imagination. And the last two helped a lot.  
They had to work on it, but it was a path that neither of them ever complained in following. On the contrary, they had a lot of fun and in the following months they were very focused in the mutual "discovery" and in finding "a common ground" and "compromises" that pleased them both.

Eventually they discovered that despite the conventions in which they were educated about the emotional, psychological and physical intimacy were very, very different, as it was the anatomy of their bodies, the Earthling and the Martian were still compatible . Very nicely compatible.

Long after, Charlene would reflect that perfection doesn't exist, especially in regard of the relationships, but there was a lot of fun in the searching for it.


	4. Following years (Throttle and Modo)

So, since the only chapters I uploaded in English were the ones involving Vinnie and Charlene, I thought it would have been nice to have one for Throttle, Carbine and Modo. This one is the union of chapters 14 and 16 from the fanfic "Cartoline da Marte" and this is also the very last one I'll ever try to translate. I'm done!  
-

**The following years (flashback** **for Throttle)**

Throttle and Carbine met/clashed in occasion of a "lively discussion" between the army and the freedom-fighters, following an assault to the monastery by a solitary Plutarkian ship.  
He was nineteen years old and had joined Stocker's group since just few months, but he was already its new rock star: he was brilliant, very self-confident and feigning a fair amount of bravado and brains.  
She was twenty and the Army rising star: intelligent, verbally aggressive and, basically, able to wipe out any opponent without breaking the war rules or the military etiquette.

When the enemy ship was sighted, the alarm was immediately launched and both armed groups responded to the distress call: both sides wanted to crush the Plutarkians, to have the joy of thrashing the enemy invaders and both claimed for themselves the precedence and the territorial right of action.

Stoker's fighters had intervened swooping by surprise from behind and starting to shoot all their paraphernalia armaments against the Plutarkian vessel well before the soldiers managed to even start to act accordingly to their own battle plan. At that point, however, the militia added its own firepower without further hesitations and, firing contemporaneously from below and from the sides, the mice prevented both a possible counterattack and the retreat of the enemy.  
The bulky vehicle had suffered heavy damage to the control system and attempted an emergency landing, but the impenetrable barrier of diamond-steel hull made that Martian victory virtually useless: yes, the Plutarkians couldn't go anywhere right now, but they were safe inside and ready to resist for as long as it was necessary.

Now, both the soldiers and the freedom fighters huddled, trying to find a breach in the hull, in order to get into the spacecraft, but at the same time also trying to chase away the others, heavily insulting and menacing each other. It was evident that soon, even among members of the same species, but belonging to opposing groups, fists would had flied and perhaps even something worse. The tension was rapidly growing.

In that chaotic riot, without a particular rush, Throttle positioned himself in the exact middle of the crowd with a loaded bazooka balanced against his right hip and, nonchalantly pointing it against them, he very politely suggested to the military soldiers to get lost and leave the Plutarkian problem to him: the soldiers weren't needed there, the freedom fighters would have taken care of it.  
However, halfway of his little monologue, a little further away, a soldier suddenly dismounted her battle bike and took off her helmet in an angry movement. She threateningly and rapidly stepped forward, separating from the rest of her companions, not so gently planting elbows and kicks in the kidneys of whoever was on her rout to Throttle and was stymying her. She advanced in that fashion to be less than meter from the boy, that only in that moment really noticed the soldier. Automatically, the mouse turned to her, unintentionally aiming the mouth of the cannon directly at her face.  
She didn't flinch.

"For me? I'm flattered. You need to compensate for something?"

"And you are... who?" Throttle asked, raising the gun on one shoulder and tilting his head slightly to one side, looking the soldier with mild curiosity.

"Lieutenant Carbine" she replied in an authoritative tone, the tone of someone accustomed to command and not be questioned "I'm the one calling the shots here" she announced coldly "You and your merry cronies should really disappear now, before things get ugly!"

Throttle laughed heartily at that "Babe, if it wasn't for yours truly, you and your tin soldiers would have been reduced to riddled rag dolls by now: that ship located you ten minutes ago!"

"Bullshit, _babe_, we had the mimesis system activated, their sensors could not register us! We had the stealth advantage here. If it wasn't for your stupid attack…"

"What stealth? Are you blind too? You had their guns aimed at you, 15 seconds longer and you'd been carnival shooting duck targets for them!"

"Ha! Yeah, right! Look, I have no time to waste with beginners. Why don't you go to smoke something, or to put flowers in your hair, or do whatever you people normally do and leave the job to the professionals, before to seriously hurt yourself?"

"You, the professionals? Okay, now I've heard everything…"

"You just come out from a paintball-game and you think you know how to handle these situations? Ridiculous! You are a bunch of kids playing war!"

"Girl, but do you listen yourself speaking? Army my ass: you are just puppets of the government, with the illusion of being an elite assault unit ... and you are so stupid that you don't even realize it!"

At that point Throttle and Carbine extracted their lasers from the respective holsters at such a speed that the others just saw a flash of metal. Those who were present at the scene stiffened, completely taken aback and now uncertain about what to do: the two mice had moved towards each other in unison, as if they had agreed about it, and their heads were now so close that it looked like the two were about to kiss, the only problem was that the expressions on their faces resembled more the ones of two angry Rottweilers, ready to rip off top of their opponent's face, and that Throttle's laser was pressing on the soldier's sternum, while Carbine's weapon was well planted against the rebel's groin.  
The two remained motionless for a few long seconds, staring hard at each other, then, suddenly, a smile, wide and mocking, unexpectedly appeared on Throttle's muzzle. He briefly looked down, below his belt, where the her gun threatened to forever jeopardize his manhood.  
"Not a very fair move, soldier!" he commented in amused and vibrant tone of voice, sardonically raising an eyebrow. Modo had to acknowledge it to him: the new guy had balls. Probably not for long still. Anatomically speaking, of course.

"Hey, you just accused us to be predictable! Moreover the academy taught me to always point to the brain. Yours is here, isn't it? " she asked him, unceremoniously pushing the weapon a bit more hardly against his genitals. Despite himself, Throttle inhaled sharply.

"You're funny too… I'm officially intrigued, but I'd also like to keep all my original parts, thank you very much. Do you mind to aim your laser elsewhere?" he asked her in a neutral tone of voice, removing first the weapon from the woman's body and placing it again in its holster.

Carbine sighed and pushed the safety catch, but she didn't sheathe the laser "Happy now?"

"Look, I'm having fun like everyone else here, but we are in an impasse, and I'm not referring this our little game..." Throttle reasoned aloud, keeping his eyes focused on hers.

"Do you really think I don't see it? More time we lose here to see who's got it bigger, more time the Plutarkians have to reorganize or ask for reinforcement!"

"Then let's work together!" he exclaimed "Look, I don't like the idea exactly as you don't, but together we have the number in our advantage. We can close it quickly"

Carbine studied him in silence for a few seconds more, as if she was trying to read in his head, then without warning she had put her gun away and gotten even closer to him. Throttle could almost feel the girl's warm breath on his own lips.  
"Alright" she said through clenched teeth, at one millimeter from his mouth, close and distant, still staring intently with a look at the same time tough and ironic "but it'll be me to lead the dances!" Then she turned around and through a microphone of the radio, on her shoulder, she ordered the army to let go of the militants and to focus on the enemy ship. Explosive charges were already ready in the capable hands of her men and everyone of them was all more than eager to kick off.  
Throttle stood watching her move among her soldiers, but then he quickly recovered, starting to give commands to his own group.

Acting more or less in agreement, it didn't take long for the rodents to open a gap in the shield, defeat the enemies and thus take possession of the ship and its armaments. During the fight inside the vessel, Throttle and Carbine found themselves side by side in at least three different moments and in all three cases they had discreetly appreciated their respective leadership skills and fighting ability.

In the end, when everything was over, the soldiers officially took command of the situation, but by then the rebels had little interest, they all had already got what they wanted: the Plutarkians were no longer a threat.

Shortly after, while she was still coordinating her platoon for their return to the base, Carbine was not particularly surprised when a black Harley Davidson joined her bike.  
"So, now will you ride into the sunset with your army, toward a new adventure, lieutenant?" Throttle asked. At that she had turned and given him the first, sincere smile of the day.

"That is more your kind of thing, isn't it freedom fighters? ... Freedom fighters ... God, who gave you that silly name? A 14 year old girl in the mood for sappy romance?"

Throtte shrugged without commenting: to be honest he himself liked the term "Martian resistance" more, but at the end of the day, it was just a matter of syntax. And Stoker LOVED the name.

"Anyway no, some paperwork for my boss and a long shower are my immediate future" she replied him "So for today I'll hang sword and shield in the closet"

Throttle looked her in silence for a little a while and then he slowly leaned forward, towards her, whispering something in her ear. Carbine didn't blushed.

"Who knows?" she replied him spicily, while fluently reaching for her helmet and wearing it, lowering its visor "Do you want to find out?"

It had been love at first sight, or something like that... two alpha who find themselves in the battlefield or end killing each other or making sparks: Throttle and Carbine had simply opted for the second, more enjoyable, of the two possibilities.  
Between their fellows, multiple betting rounds about how long that story would have lasted had been organized. There were those who predicted just few weeks on fire and who stated the impossibility for them to survive 48 hours together. Vinnie lost a lot of money when it became evident that Throttle and Carbine wanted to go steady and Modo had been more than happy to pocket his friend's small loot.

There were no promises, no oaths of eternal love, but they stayed together for the following years, through thick and thin. In honesty, it hadn't been exactly easy: they both had a stubborn character, strong and dominant, but neither of them ever thought to search for something else (well, someone else) "simpler" and of "easier management". Both wanted to have an equal at their side and the other was a stimulating companion. And then, if it wasn't already obvious, they were in love.  
Later there was the little issue of the Plutarkian trap, the prison camp, their escape and then Earth, that unpleasant treason accuse and, finally, Limburger's defeat.  
After returning to Mars, he and his friends were officially reassigned to the base, this time under the direct command of Carbine, who had made in the meantime a brilliant career in the new, reformed Martian army.  
While it was difficult for Throttle getting used again to be a subordinate and not his own boss, on the other hand it had been a relief to finally be obligated to clarify once and for all were they really stand.  
They care deeply for each other, this was never questioned and it definitely was not the problem. It never was the problem. The problem was that perhaps they never said it enough: if certain things are taken for granted for too long, you get to a point where you do not know anymore exactly what your partner thinks, needs or wants.  
And, let's face it, they also beat around the bush for years. Both of them. They wanted to be together, of course, but in the past there had been too much at stake to seriously think about the future, all such good excuses to postpone that particular issue and, after that, they were separated for so long that they almost couldn't recognize themselves anymore.

In the months and then years that followed they had to start over from scratch, distanced from each other to clearly understand how they really felt and what they wanted, and they went from there. Setting aside disagreements and misunderstandings, they sought to discover again the people they had become in time they were separated. It went better than they initially expected: it was nice, although quite strange, to court again , to take the time to rediscover the other.

The new mission on Earth caught them slightly off guard , but the situation was very different now and when the trio of bikers and Charley returned to Mars , Throttle and Carbine happily found themselves at the same point where they had left a year and a half before. Little had changed, if you ignored the fact that the Catatonians were no longer a threat and that the Martian population wasn't anymore under siege, forced into a militarized life 7/24 ... in conclusion, minor details.

So, apart from some "traditional" quarrels with the sands raiders and having to deal with the Catatonians guerrillas, things had suddenly calmed down on Mars. Throttle had now more regular schedule (indeed, to be precise, for the first time in his life he had a schedule. Unbelievable!), a paid employment (the 'powers that be' had suddenly realized that in fact, yes, you had to get a pay for the work you were doing, especially if it implied risking your neck on a daily basis), lived in a real home and slept in a real bed, next to his mate, who wasn't looking him anymore from cold computer monitors, barely once at week, with that detached and professional look she assumed when there was a public present at their video conference meetings.

If Carbine had her future well planned and was working hard for it, Throttle didn't stand on the sidelines: he too decided to pursue a career in the Martian militia, especially in the light of the occurred merge between the authorized army and the freedom fighters and, following this event, the fact that now the military life was finally become something of more congenial to him: the soldiers weren't anymore just a bunch of bigots, lacking of initiative and with a manual stuck up their...  
"...Aehmmm! Sorry Carb, obviously it wasn't referred at you! "  
"Obviously. Anyway, gorgeous, tonight you are sleeping on the couch"  
"Yes. Yes, it seems fair... "

To avoid problems and possible accusations of nepotism, Throttle applied for and obtained a reassignment to a different unit, no longer under his partner's command. In the new position he also worked alongside Mode at the military academy, as trainer and instructor of "Tactics and professional ethics, logic, legal and sociological argumentation" (translated to "punch him until he gives up and then punch him some more, just to be safe , Biker Mice Style").

They never married , but being Throttle the last one of its family branch and not having any close relative anymore, he was accepted in Carbine's clan, acquiring the name of her family group, in many ways an even deeper commitment for the Martian culture.  
"Ohhhh, it's so damn sweet: you are Mr. Carbine now!" Modo and Vinnie teased him later, to play down just a bit the seriousness of that event, but Throttle didn't care at all: he was a macho, certainly not a chauvinist! And moreover he really liked the idea of belonging to a real clan again . Since his parents' death he didn't feel anymore that sense of belonging that the formal and psychic link created among members of the same clan, led. He missed it and when Carbine, a little shyly, made that proposal, he had agreed without hesitation.

They had not children, they didn't really want any at the moment, but if they would have ever changed their mind in the future, a bit unlikely actually, Martian biology anyhow gave them more time for that particular choice: the mice had a much longer fertility cycle than humans and they could conceive a child at any time. But for now they were okay with being just the two of them.

**The following years (Fast forward for Modo)**

Modo was the first leave the military world. He joined the rebels' ranks to defend his family and his planet, because it was undoubtedly "the only right thing to do", but, honestly, he never madly loved that reality. When it became evident that his contribution for the peace wasn't needed anymore and that everything would have gone all for the better even without him, Modo started to look elsewhere for his own realization.  
Not that he wasn't happy with the choices he made in his past, if he could go back in time, he would have surely done exactly the same thing again, he really was genuinely satisfied with his life up to that moment: he had a purpose, he made the difference for himself and for the people he loved, but now he was ready for a change, to give a new direction to his life and do something new.

At the time, when his adventure began and he found himself fighting for the survival of his species, he was not much older than a kid and everything still seemed so very far away. Surely the least one of his thoughts was to find the answer the question "what should I be when I grow up?". The future was something he could barely conceive, let alone to stop and think about how the events and the choice that would be derived from them, could radically change his destiny.  
Actually, if the situation had not been what it was, they surely would have never ever let him cross the door of the recruitment office (a corner in the freedom fighters' armory/warehouse, in which, if you looked intently, you could see a tattered sleeping bag that had seen better days and in which Stoker, when he could, collapsed for a short nap), but Modo was already a big boy, frighteningly muscled at just seventeen, when the vast majority of the kids his age still struggled with the total lack of harmony and grace that the Adolescence gives generously to all the growing males of any species. No one opposed at the idea of having Modo among the new recruits, especially when they saw the bike he had brought in "dowry" and the undeniable talent he immediately demonstrated as a fighter.

The problem now was that, for an individual who was barely able to finish his studies before the school, literally, exploded around him and he was forced by the events to run on the bike of his father to enlist, it was difficult to understand how to move: he was an adult who lived half his life as a soldier without really having the character for it and, above it all, without never really have the opportunity to develop other skills.

During the war it didn't seem important, there were far more pressing priorities to front: he still had his family to think about and now new friends among his fellow freedom fighters who became to him as close as real brothers. He married and then suddenly was a widower in the best and the most painful year of his life. It was incredibly difficult, but he was been able to go back on his feet and returned to the fight. He continued to contribute to a fight against a stronger enemy, they discovered that the Martian planet had been betrayed by its own government, he lost an arm in a bloody battle and had been imprisoned in an enemy camp. He fled with Throttle and Vinnie, the three of them always together now, to fall on Earth where they continued to fight the same enemy that made life a nightmare on his own planet.

No, definitely there had not been much time to send out resumes.

After the defeat of the Catatonian army, Modo initially remained in the ranks of the Martians fighters to help out: indeed he was now a hero and a veteran and there was literally rows of young soldiers looking at him with round eyes, hanging off his words and expressly requiring to be trained by him. There had been a lot of pressure from above *cough*Carbine*cough* for him to enlist as field trainer for the army.  
They were fun years indeed. He participated to the education of five "litter" of new Martians soldiers, kids still wet behind the ears, but that had already experienced an alien invasion and war. They all were hotheads, as he himself had been at their age, and it was a pleasure to have a role in their formation, but over time, Modo convinced himself that others could easily take his place and do a job just as good as his, if not better. Amid his cadets' protests and tears, he resigned and embarked on a new road.

The big guy already had an approximate idea of what he wanted to do since that time he helped Charley during the renovation of the building she ended owning on Mars.  
Well, to be perfectly honest to just say "help" was an understatement of how much he was involved into that project: Throttle had quickly (and conveniently) disappeared behind the new obligations his high-ranking grade and a certain lady-general required him. Vinnie tried his best, but it became clear that as long there were walls to disintegrate, the boy had some utility, but when he was request to handle trowels and concrete, the most likely outcome was a lopsided structure, not unlike the Pisa tower, and a mouse covered in cement from the tip of his toes up to inside his ears. Charley had done what she could, but she didn't have the experience nor the physical strength for that kind of work so, at the end of the fair, Modo had willingly handled most of the job by himself. And he enjoyed it.

When he was a kid, he often fantasized with her father about a future job related to architecture: he always liked the capital buildings, those towers of glass and red rock that were integrated so harmoniously in the Martian landscape (not that the time he expressed this appreciation for the architecture in such an articulated way: to his father, that led him on a trip in the city, he simply commented "How cool dad!". But the idea behind that comment was that one) .

When the war broke, most of the cities were destroyed, the main buildings razed to the ground and of all the architectural richness of Mars, little had survived.  
But by then Modo felt too old to start pursuing that career and, let's face it, it wasn't like he really wanted to be too involved with books (if he ever really had it in him), but surely his strength and resourcefulness could still find application in the field of the constructions.

Then he made a work out of his hobby, initially participating as a volunteer in various construction sites, learning what he could from anyone who wanted and was able to teach him; in time he made a name in that field and it didn't take long for the manager of a small construction business to contact him for a contract and paid job. So he gladly accepted it.  
At first it surely wasn't a work of fineness, for the most part it consisted in moving beams and girders, climbing on scaffolding and erect walls, but it was something. There was something incredible to build from nothing, with his own hands, a house. A home in which someone would have lived. A family. Yes, that work was alive and rewarding, but even more important, it was a job that made him infinitely happy.

She had a chocolate-brown colored fur, was a couple of years older than him and had two twins, still crawling, from her previous marriage. They met through work, when he was assigned as site manager to the construction of a new wing of the Senators' Chamber. She worked as junior in the magister's local section and, she being the youngest and the only female, got landed of the renewal work supervision. Later she admitted without embarrassment that that one was the only time she was grateful to have chauvinists for chiefs: it was thanks to those idiots she met Modo.

Courtship , if ever there was one, had been flash: one evening Modo introduced her to the gang as " a new friend " and, for what the others could remember, half a minute later they were already married.  
The girl wasn't a stunning beauty (at least if you respected Vinnie's judgment, which nobody did actually), but she was very pretty and had a contagious smile. She sported with serenity soft and generous physique and was a lot shorter than Charlene, thus being amusingly tiny when she was alongside Modo, but she was sharp-tongued and knew how to always obtain respect. Who knew her professionally could hardly recognize the woman when he was with his mate: at work she was known to be awfully tough and uncompromising with those who stamped his feet, but when she was with Modo or her children she showed a sweetness out of the ordinary. It was the kind of person who had two separate personalities, for the work and for the affective universe and , in the latter, she gave all of herself.

Since she wanted focus on her career, the two had declared from the beginning they would wait a few years before trying to have a son, after all there were already the twins and those two little children plenty fulfilled any fatherly ambition of the gray giant. But accidents happen, and short after Modo rejoiced for the birth of a third child. The "incident" repeated two more times, few years later (another boy and then a girl), and, considering the rugby team the couple was creating, it had become clear that, no, accidents didn't happen. Never. They were clearly planned.  
But no one ever hinted they had guessed the couple's little secret.


End file.
